Education in de Blasio’s second term

IT’S THE UNOFFICIAL FIRST DAY OF DE BLASIO’S SECOND TERM. “We proved we could make schools safer,” the mayor said during his victory speech last night. But the mayor has delayed several key education announcements and initiatives until after the election, so here’s what to look out for in the coming weeks and months:

— Renewal schools. November marks the three-year mark for the city’s controversial Renewal School program, a $582 million initiative to flood about 100 of the city’s lowest-performing schools with social and academic services. De Blasio has vowed to assess the program this month and determine which schools aren’t making enough progress — and he’s said he’ll definitely close some schools in the program. Over a dozen Renewals have already been closed or merged, and it’s likely a significant number of Renewals will be slated for closure later this month. Here’s a look at some of the schools in the program that are falling behind the pack, via POLITICO New York’s Eliza Shapiro and Brendan Cheney.

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— Academic quality at yeshivas. De Blasio and city schools chancellor Carmen Fariña have been promising a report on academics at the city’s yeshivas for over a year — but there’s been widespread speculation that the report has been delayed until after the election for political reasons. Expect the pressure for some results to ramp up now that the election is over. Read more about the issue here, via The New York Times’ Kate Taylor.

— Charters. Although the mayor hasn’t had a major dust-up with the city’s charter sector in a few years, Success Academy is applying new pressure on City Hall to find co-located space for several of its new charters, which are slated to open in August 2018. From a memo sent to reporters by Success CEO Eva Moskowitz on Tuesday: “The Department of Education claims that because students don’t actually need the space until the beginning of the next school year (August 2018), no urgency is warranted in addressing Success Academy’s requests. This argument ignores the state education law requiring space requests be approved by the Panel for Educational Policy within 5 months of the request; legally, the City should have proposed co-locations by May 5, in time for the PEP to vote at its June 2017 meeting. Six months later, the DOE has still not provided viable solutions for Success Academy’s space needs. This delay affects some very practical planning needs of the SA network and is dismissive of Success families’ desire — and need — to have the basic information of where their children will be attending school.” The DOE responded in a statement: “We have been in close communication with Success Academy regarding these requests and the deadline for submitting proposals for the 2018-19 school year is next March.”

GOOD WEDNESDAY MORNING. Carmen Fariña will visit a charter school in Queens and then attend a town hall meeting in Brooklyn. MaryEllen Elia will participate in a roundtable discussion on community schools at Binghamton University. Former White House senior adviser on education, Rev. Dr. Bryant Marks Sr., will conduct My Brother’s Keeper Implicit Bias Intensive Training at the University of Albany. Betty Rosa did not release a public schedule.

CON CON DEFEATED SOUNDLY — POLITICO New York’s Bill Mahoney: New Yorkers have overwhelmingly rejected a ballot question asking whether the state should hold a constitutional convention, with only 19 percent voting “yes” after nearly half of election districts had been counted. Notably, most of these districts were in New York City, the region that consistently gave the strongest degree of support to the convention question in polls taken in recent months … And most significantly, organized labor focused most of its election season efforts on defeating the referendum. The state’s top unions spent millions of dollars paying for a social media campaign, television advertisements, and hundreds of thousands of lawn signs. The “yes” campaign picked up a few new converts. Both the League of Women Voters and the Bar Association flipped their positions from 20 years prior, taking the view that a convention would be the most realistic way to accomplish goals like election reform. But the “yes” campaign still lacked the sort of champion who could either match the unions’ deep pockets or center attention on their issue. Proponents expressed hope a couple of years ago that a deep-pocketed source who wasn’t a major player 20 years ago — maybe Michael Bloomberg, for example, or charter school supporters — would make an attempt to reshape state government, but none did. And none of the out-of-state billionaires who opponents repeatedly said would swoop in to urge a “yes” vote ever materialized. Read more here.

STATE BUDGET UPDATE: Lagging revenues are opening up an $8.73 billion gap in the New York State budget over the next 17 months, Comptroller Tom DiNapoli estimated in a required forecast issued late last week. That's more than double Gov. Andrew Cuomo's current estimate. DiNapoli, a Democrat, estimates that tax collections will lag $1.85 billion behind the latest projections by the Cuomo administration's Division of the Budget, which were issued in August. DiNapoli's office says the shortfall is prompted by depressed income tax collections. — POLITICO New York’s Jimmy Vielkind. Read more here.

AROUND NEW YORK:

— “Long Island falls far behind in providing quality state-funded prekindergarten education and greater efforts must be made to expand such services to the youngest learners, state Commissioner of Education MaryEllen Elia said Tuesday at a conference in Woodbury.” — Newsday’s Joie Tyrrell. Read more here.

— “High school students in Niagara Falls would receive more information about sex and contraception under a plan being considered by the Board of Education. But it remains an open question whether contraceptives would be distributed to them.” — Buffalo News’ Thomas J. Prohaska. Read more here.

— “The University at Buffalo medical school is starting to move into its new digs on the Buffalo Niagara Medical Campus.” — Buffalo News’ Karen Robinson. Read more here.

— “State Education Commissioner MaryEllen Elia on Tuesday upheld the Massapequa school district’s relocation of sixth-graders to Berner Middle School, a move that took effect in September amid rancor in the South Shore community.” — Newsday’s Scott Eidler. Read more here.

ACROSS THE RIVER:

— One of the earliest groups to endorse Gov.-elect Phil Murphy was the New Jersey Education Association. That early endorsement by the state’s largest teachers union, coupled with the fact that funding for schools remains the largest chunk of a homeowner’s property tax bill, means New Jerseyans can expect key education issues to figure prominently in the new Murphy administration. — POLITICO New Jersey’s Linh Tat. Read more here.

— “Last week, the Christie administration announced its new ‘Lighthouse District’ initiative to praise schools and districts that have exhibited a combination of best practices and improved performances. It was a celebratory affair at the State Board of Education meeting …, with educators from seven districts called up receive the inaugural distinction. … [But some] State Board members had questions about the criteria, with one pointing out they were virtually all relatively small school districts.” — NJ Spotlight’s John Mooney. Read more here.

AROUND THE NATION:

— “The tax legislation that House Republicans proposed last week includes several changes that could affect student loans: the ability to deduct the interest on your loan would be eliminated; tuition paid by an employer would become taxable; and three existing tax breaks would be consolidated into one. It’s hard to immediately tell how any one person would fare because of the wholesale change across the entire tax system.” — The New York Times’ Tara Siegel Bernard and Guilbert Gates. — Read more here.

— The House Republican tax plan would be "devastating" for charter schools, making it even harder for them to access and finance school buildings, the National Alliance for Public Charter Schools said Tuesday in a letter to Ways and Means Committee leadership.

Charter schools often "rely on tax-exempt bonds to finance their school facilities," writes Nina Rees, president and CEO of the charter school advocacy group. "Because of their unique governance structure, charter schools typically do not have access to facilities, or facilities financing, in the way that traditional schools and school districts have access," Rees writes. — POLITICO’s Caitlin Emma

— “The House Republican tax proposal could threaten the revenue streams of colleges and universities, Moody's Investors Service said in a note Tuesday. The credit rating agency wrote that the bill, H.R. 1 (115), is 'a potential credit negative' for higher education because of a range of provisions, including those that would tax private university endowments, eliminate education tax credits, raise borrowing costs and curb incentives for charitable donations." — POLITICO’s Michael Stratford

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About The Author : Eliza Shapiro

Eliza is the New York City education reporter for POLITICO New York. She chronicles all K-12 education policy and politics in the city, with a focus on Department of Education-related politics, charter schools and special education.

Previously, Eliza covered national politics and crime for The Daily Beast.

About The Author : Keshia Clukey

Keshia Clukey reports on K-12 and higher education in New York state for POLITICO New York's Albany bureau.

A native of Plattsburgh, New York, Keshia has a bachelor's degree in journalism from Utica College and a master's degree in investigative journalism from the University of Strathclyde in Glasgow, Scotland. Keshia has worked at several newspapers in the state, most recently as a breaking news and crime reporter for the Times Union in Albany, and has received a number of awards for her work from state and national press agencies.